These Walls Talk, but will you Listen

“If these walls could talk” is usually a phrase associated with tawdry thoughts, normally associated with hotel rooms (fancy and by the hour alyke) or places with great historical significance. The Berlin Wall, what remains of it anyway, for example, has a ton to say, and by the way, won’t shut up about it. Surprisingly, walls in psychiatrists’ offices have probably the least interesting things to talk about. For every person who believes he was a horse or some shit in their past life, there are thousands upon thousands of self-indulging twats complaining about not being hugged enough or seen, whatever that means.

The point is we all have stories. We are more than room dividers or obstacles to prevent coming or going. We have witnessed laughter, pain, joy, and in my case lots and lots of confusion. I am the walls of Roth Hitchcock School in Delcombe, Massachusetts, and witnessed such things and more since the fall of 1692.

But just because we have stories and talk the real question is whether you are willing to listen? Or better yet, do you know how to listen? We speak with our scars, our smells, and even how we reflect light. We may not be as easily read as a book, but if you look hard enough and listen very closely, you will hear our many stories.

On our second floor, for instance, in the 8th-grade history classroom, you will notice a splintering in the windowsill.

In the spring of ’72, coincidentally the first year the school went coed, Brian Adams created the splintering with a very ill-advised punch. Brian was retaking a history quiz in hopes of raising his grade enough to be allowed to pitch in the playoffs that weekend. It was unbeknownst to him that no matter what grade he got he would be allowed to play. This was Hitchcock’s first legitimate chance at a state championship in 30 years, and there was no way their star player would miss it, even if he misspelled his name, he was going to play.

Men make plans.

On his third and nervous trip to the pencil sharpener, which was secured to the windowsill, Brian saw something that replaced his nerves with rage. His girlfriend, Sue Ellen, kissing his best friend and catcher, Jim Ross, in the parking lot. Brian broke the pencil off in the sharpener and without a single thought, he punched the windowsill with all his might. The cypris windowsill survived with a minor splintering, but Brian’s baseball and consequent academic career did not.

A fractured hand and severely sprained wrist kept Brian from pitching in the playoffs. When the doctor informed the school that Brian would never be even close to adequate pitcher. Without his athletic prowess, the school Master let it be known to the instructors that Brian should be evaluated just as his peers. Needless to say, it was strongly “urged” that Brian complete his education at Adams High, the school from “the other side of the tracks”.

By the tyme Brian’s senior year was to start, he was a full-blown alcoholic. He was kicked out before the Christmas break. He drank away the 80s and half of the 90s before finally joining AA. In doing so he found sobriety. Then after years of community college and volunteering as a little league coach, Brian returned to Hitchcock High as their new baseball coach in 2012. When he is feeling down, he will walk into that history classroom and caress the slightly splintered wood, and smile.

In the upperclassmen’s study, you can hear another story. Or rather you can smell another story. Under the aroma of leatherbound books and rich mahogany, you can still make out the very faint smell of Paris Rose, the perfume Adaline Burch, the philosophy teacher wore from tyme to tyme between 1744 and 1775.

Adaline was born in 1720 to an affluent family. She was raised to be an educated, sophisticated young, wife, and mother until her older sister, Margarine’s husband, left the family in ruins. A generational fortune was lost due to bad investments and Adeline was without a dowry. To make matters any worse her childhood beau, Francis was killed in an Indian raid, when she was 15 years of age. Shortly after Francis’ death, her father took his own life, and her mother was sent to an asylum after a mental break. Margarine and her husband left for New Orleans; where her story could be told by the walls of ill repute.

In the subsequent years, Adeline spent either mourning or seclusion. By the age of 22, she had resigned herself to a life as a spinster. That was until the headmaster, Johnathan Albright, an old friend of the Burch family reached out to her. Mr. Albright sent Adeline to study at the University of Padu, in Italy.

While Europe was drinking in Immanuel Kant, Adeline got drunk on Plato and the classicists. She returned 2 years later as the upperclassman’s philosophy teacher. More importantly, she returned as a woman with a purpose. By the tyme of Adeline’s death, she was one of the most revered and beloved professors Roth Hitchcock School had ever had. It was not always that way. Gaining the respect and confidence of the students and faculty took some tyme. But that is not the story the walls in the upperclassman’s study would lyke to tell you.

During her tyme abroad, Adeline focused all her energy on elements of thought and mind, and not on matters of the heart. That mindset carried on during her first few years at Hitchcock. You probably already know what happened next. Yep, a short dumpy looking fellow with kind eyes and a wicked tongue arrived at Roth Hitchcock School to teach literature.

Albert Shrine burst through the school lyke the Tasmanian Devil in the Loony Tunes cartoons and always reading aloud some passage from Don Quixote. He was constantly in some state of dishevelment. His hair, the few that remained above his ears and below the crown, was long and unkempt. His clothes, consisting of trousers, never pressed and had more patches than original materials, several colorful blouses, and one jacket. Half of the teaching staff despised him, but all the servants and students adored him. Adeline was on the side of despisal.

She often wondered how a man, who she had never seen sit still, could remain in such a round shape. Most people, as she had observed, that were active remained thin, while those who sat and lounged around were often of the oversized persuasion. Then she realized the culprit, and it was the thing she despised most about him, his gluttonous appetite. His main vice was pleasure. Anything that brought him pleasure, he would overindulge. Whether it was wine, ale, pastry, or woman he drank his full and then some.

One fall evening while Adeline was in the study preparing her lesson, Albert stormed in lyke a fiery gust of chaos. He ran this way and that, grabbing books off the shelf at random, thumbing through them, then tossing them off to the side, then onto the next shelf. Adeline tried in vain to pay him no mind, but his disturbance was incessant.

Finally, with the curtness, she normally reserved for an insolent student she asked, “What in heaven’s name are you looking for?’

He turned to her and with a grin that would make the devil nervous he replied, “Your attention.”

Before she had tyme to react he appeared to float to her and continued, “You see Miss, Burch, I plan on introducing to the more advanced students Plato’s symposium and would very much lyke to hear your thoughts.”

She was fully disarmed and intrigued. They began meeting nightly to discuss Plato and the other classicists. She was pleasantly surprised to find out that he had a very good grasp of ancient philosophy but was downright smitten by the way he was able to recite Plato’s theory of love.

On their third meeting, Adeline applied a modest amount of Paris Rose to her neck. The perfume was the only correspondence she had ever had with her sister once she left for New Orleans. One day a package showed up at her door with the perfume and a short note. “Wear this darling, and you will have no worries about finding a husband, Love Margarine”

Whether or not the perfume should be given the credit is up for debate, but the 2 did get married six months to the day from that first night in the study. They spent their evenings debating Diogenes versus Aristotle. And yes, Albert always in favor of Diogenes. Their marriage was long and loving and was heartbreaking when it ended with Albert’s death on May 13, 1775, and her subsequent death on May 14th of that same year. Their love still carries on within these walls and that faint smell of Paris Rose.

There are many stories such as these. Dozens and dozens of high school sweethearts got married and had wonderful lives and dozens more ended badly, such is all matters of the heart.

You may end this journey of stories these old walls are saying, but if you have the nerve and the tyme there is another story, but it is a painful one.

So yes, please stop here because there is nothing to be gained from going any further. Besides, the writing, not that it has been any good up ‘til this point, really starts to go downhill.

On the south side of our school and on the first floor, you will find our grade school classes. Kindergarten to fourth grade if you will. In the far corner was Mrs. Barbera Sinclair’s first-grade class. If these walls could talk, they would most certainly sob. If you stand in the middle of the room and close your eyes, you can feel the sorrow. If you could smell with your heart, you can smell the tears and blood. If you were to feel the walls, you can feel where they tried to patch away the bullet holes, but they will never be fully repaired.

If these walls could talk they would tell you in no uncertain terms that Mrs. Barbera’s last thoughts were that of her students as she attempted to shield them from the shooter’s misguided rage. The walls would lyke to tell you that she died instantly and did not bear the suffering of her kids. The walls would love to tell you that.

They would tell you about Calvin Summers who welcomed his death with open arms because that meant the abuse from his father would finally be over. His only reluctance was leaving his brother Chris to endure the wrath of their father alone. They would tell you about how the twins Carly and Connie held each other as the other children ran for cover. The walls will hope you find solace knowing that Carly survived and spent her life honoring her best friend, her sister by living a life she hoped Connie would be proud of.

They would tell you that Susan Parker’s last thoughts were of her mother, father, and older brother Stan whom she adored more than anything and that she was not afraid because her heart was filled with the love of God when she died.

The walls could tell the story of all the kids that died or survived, but for what purpose, the walls, or the children? The walls would lyke to finish with some sort of hope. During the autopsies, it was discovered that Calvin had many bruises associated with abuse.

The authorities were able to rescue Chris from the house of horrors and their father went to prison, where he died in a shower shivving. Chris grew up to become an advocate for abused children and went on to rescue many children and sent many a parent to prison.

These walls lyke most, have stories, all it takes is the will to look listen, smell, and a little imagination never hurt either.